The trip to Davis went pretty well. Leif slept 3 of the 4 flights. The other flight (second half of the flight to Sacramento) was pretty bad - we were stuck on the runway at O'Hare for about an hour before taking off (Big surprise. I don't think I've ever had a flight out of O'Hare that wasn't stuck on the runway for an hour) and Leif got a little antsy during the last hour and a half or so. Then he fell asleep as we were landing. Go figure.

The Whole Earth Festival was pretty amazing. I've never been all that into it before, but it's an entirely different experience when you're a parent who's been living in Virginia for a year. Moms lie around in the grass breastfeeding their babies. Most of the babies are held a lot of the time, even if the parents brought strollers. Many wear cloth diapers.

Such a strange contrast to here.

I guess that's what happens when the entire hippy population of the Bay Area and Sacramento Valley descends on an area the size of a city block.

Leif wasn't feeling very well a lot of the time. He had a pretty miserable time on Friday, developed a bit of a fever, and then ended up being constipated most of the weekend (yes, we were trying to keep him hydrated). Poor guy. I feel bad about dragging him around everywhere like we did, but I doubt that staying at our host's house would have been any better for him.

Despite all that, my family still thought he was the most good-natured baby ever. It really makes me wonder about other babies when people tell us how wonderfully behaved he is when he's at his worst.

Pictures will be up when I get around to it.

This past week has basically sucked. It's been oppressively hot, and Leif's sleep schedule is all thrown off from jet lag. Yesterday I had a really weird sickness - headache and nausea for a few hours, and then it went away. At first I thought it was caffeine withdrawal, then the nausea hit, and I thought it was the flu. And then it went away. It wasn't dehydration, but could have been heat related.

Leif may have had a bit of it, too. He was awfully fussy, and wanted to be held constantly. It's just so much fun trying to take care of a fussy baby when you're sick yourself.

I haven't heard anything of the infamous 17-year cicadas, which I suppose I should count as a blessing. I'm guessing that this area has been torn up within the last 17 years, so we don't have many. Leif and I may go down by the creek later and see if I can find any.

Today we went to Starbucks. I was sitting in one of the comfy chairs nursing Leif when a deerfly flew at me. I thought it was a bee (it's a similar size, with striped markings), and freaked out. I've had a bit of a bee phobia since reading A Taste of Blackberries as a kid, made worse when my dad ended up hospitalized after getting stung (it was on the news and everything... he managed to get stung while a live news story was being taped nearby. They even sent a reporter to the hospital to make sure he was ok). I thought that it had landed on my head, and I was right. koyote managed to get it away before it bit me.

It continued hovering around us, and we were about to leave when it landed on the arm of a guy sitting next to us. He knocked it away, and it coincidentally hit a spider's web.

At first it looked like it would get away. It was huge compared to the web, and only stuck by one leg. But as it struggled, it got more and more entangled. I know spider silk is strong, but this seemed pretty amazing, like a fishing line holding a human.

The spider was just this teensy little thing, probably a tenth the size of the fly. It scurried around for quite a while trying to bite the fly, but couldn't manage because it was struggling so hard. Eventually the fly either got too entangled or worn out, and the spider bit it. When we left, the fly had stopped moving and the spider was getting it wrapped up.

I almost felt sorry for the fly, until I remembered that a few minutes ago it had been trying to eat me.

Lucky day for the spider. That fly should provide it with food for life.